


meet me where the cliff meets the sea

by the_bisexual_disaster



Series: kat's classy fics (tm) [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Daenerys Targaryen (mentioned) - Freeform, F/M, Sansa Stark (Mentioned) - Freeform, architect!gendry, bi!arya, its not explicitly mentioned but engineering major!arya, past Arya Stark/Daenerys Targaryen, theyre both awkward disasters i love them, this is based on these stairs at my actual uni, title barely corresponds to actual content but its also like 11:30 pm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-07
Updated: 2020-02-07
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:48:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22597321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_bisexual_disaster/pseuds/the_bisexual_disaster
Summary: An unfortunate incident leads Arya to a slightly problematic architect through a string of dumb luck and poorly planned decisions. She was never one to believe in fate, but perhaps that might change.
Relationships: Arya Stark/Gendry Waters
Series: kat's classy fics (tm) [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1815244
Comments: 43
Kudos: 85





	meet me where the cliff meets the sea

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts), [Sklirotiri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sklirotiri/gifts), [Slytherin_Princess_Nysa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slytherin_Princess_Nysa/gifts).



> title from élan by nightwish  
> in all sincerity, this was meant to be crack, but maybe led to me also projecting my frustrations about my uni’s main campus onto my favourite character and then having her find love.

It happened without any warning.

In retrospect, if Arya had the forethought to look up from her phone every once in a while, especially while walking down stairs, she might not have walked directly into the fountain at the bottom of this particular section. However, had the architects who designed this stupid fucking staircase had some brain cells between them, she  _ definitely _ wouldn’t have just walked directly into a fountain and soaked her legs in the middle of January on a day when she didn’t drive to campus. 

Because of fucking course that had to happen today of all days. 

Arya felt an indescribable rage fill her chest as she tried and failed to resist screaming in frustration and embarrassment in public. If she weren’t so furious at whoever designed the stairs leading to the applied sciences building, she might have cried. If any of her brothers were here, she might have laughed at how ridiculous the whole situation was.

Instead, she began to formulate a plan.

It wasn’t a very good one, in retrospect, and looking back, she was shocked that it actually worked. Her plan was twofold; find the person who designed the stairs that led to her public humiliation and give them a piece of her mind. The problem with her plan was finding the architect in the first place, which required a lot of digging and possibly some things that might have been crime, like finding and stealing the plans to the school.

The applied sciences building had been added on recently, and therefore that whole section of the campus was quite new. Arya remembered very distinctly just how much of her past four years here had been spent taking detours and walking aimlessly trying to get from one place to another. It was one of the most frustrating experiences of her life and she grew up with five boys and Sansa. 

Because that particular section of the building was new, the plans weren’t that hard to find, and maybe she didn’t  _ exactly _ steal them. She just took a picture of it and ran as fast as she could before anyone could see her. She realized a bit too late that she didn’t see if the architect’s name was in the photo.

Somehow, it was. 

Gendry Waters.

———————

“Why do you need to speak to Mr. Waters?” The receptionist looked and sounded so very bored, even with Arya’s sudden appearance and odd request.

“I have to talk to him about a job he did,” Arya explained. “It was… less than satisfactory.” 

Arya was so grateful Sansa hadn’t texted her yet. Knowing her, she might have tried to convince her younger sister that all these dumb strokes of luck despite Arya’s absolute bullshittery was some kind of fate pulling her towards this person, this Gendry, whoever they were. Arya, however, was just shocked that she got away with such a stupid excuse and poor planning yet again. The receptionist led her through the building and into an office, where she left her without more than a monotonous introduction.

While on her way over, Arya had planned out everything she was going to say to this man. She had everything written down and rehearsed, she had notes and ideas and thoughts and maybe a few vague insults to throw his way. Once she looked into his ocean blue eyes and took in his shaggy dark hair, all of that careful planning went out the window along with her ability to form sentences. 

“Miss?”  _ God, his voice… _ “Miss, are you alright?” He looked at her with such concern in his eyes she forgot to be angry. She no longer felt the heavy dampness of her jeans or the discomfort of her still soaked socks. All she felt was the warm rumble of his voice as it heated her cheeks and the racing of her heart. 

“Um… I uh… had something I needed to… t-talk about.” Arya stammered, still unable to speak English. “W-with you, obviously!”

He didn’t reply. He only looked at her and it was all she could do not to get lost in his eyes.

“There are these stairs, you see, and I think you were the one to design them but the-they were actually kind of poorly designed and I-there was a bit of a um…  _ incident _ earlier and I uh… I have a picture of the plans right here,” she elaborated, showing him the picture of the plans on her phone.

He couldn’t take his eyes off her, she noticed. It was almost like he was either hypnotized or as dumbfounded as she was, but Arya didn’t consider either option to be likely. She was never the “pretty” one and she had a temper but rarely a filter. She said what came to her mind, which made her seem abrasive to some. Men paid attention to her, yes, but they treated her the way one might treat a good meal or a new toy. This man… he was different. 

The trance was broken when he finally looked at the phone in her hand and yelled “Fuck!” so loudly it made her jump. 

“Don’t tell me you… “

Arya nodded.

“There’s no railings or anything here! What kind of moronic fucknugget- I’m so sorry about this. I haven’t been doing this that long and it’s just like me to miss the smallest things.”

“It’s alright,” she whispered.

“It really isn’t alright,” he sighed. “Thanks though, for bringing this to my attention, Miss…”

“Stark!” Arya replied after a moment, not realizing he was asking for her name. “Arya Stark.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Miss Stark.” He extended his hand in invitation and, like a dumbass, she took it but instead of shaking his hand, she just held on.

“You’re meant to shake it,” he whispered, after what felt like several minutes of awkward silence.

“Right,” she breathed, but neither of them moved or released each other’s hand. She found herself yet again gazing into the deep blue of his eyes and before she knew it, her mouth was on his and she was being hoisted onto his desk.

———————

Arya was so extremely glad she moved out as soon as she could to go to school in King’s Landing instead of Winterfell. If she had been walking into her mother’s house five hours after she was supposed to be home, she would have gotten into so much shit, even at 22. Her roommate and ex-girlfriend Dany, however, didn’t care. The two could not afford to move out and find new places after they broke up, so they stayed living together and reached a mutual agreement to stay as civil and friendly as possible. Therefore, she was perfectly able to go go her room to look Gendry up on Instagram without any interruptions.

She fell into the rabbit hole that was Gendry’s social media. He had a lot of posts, but very few were of him and most of them were of his work as an architect, and some were even some aesthetic pictures that surprised Arya. He didn’t seem like the type to post aesthetics.

It was the selfies and the few shirtless pics that captivated Arya’s attention. She found herself staring at them for longer than she needed to, only taking breaks to message him and tease him about the mess that was his Instagram page. 

It was while she was admiring one of said shirtless pics that something hard and metallic collided with her stomach. She ended up flipping over a metal bar and landing painfully on her back, her feet splashing into the water.

“Ow,” she groaned.

——————-

_ nightwolf: so i see you finally put up that railing _

_ thebull: i did. do u like it? _

_ nightwolf: yeah, but i did just lowkey flip over it _

_ thebull: … _

_ thebull: how? _

_ nightwolf: will you believe me if i say it became a sentient being and yeeted me down the stairs? _

_ thebull: i barely even know what “yeeted” means so no _

_ nightwolf: fine _

_ nightwolf: *is typing* _

_ thebull: you weren’t paying attention were you _

_ thebull: i bet you werent paying attention the first time either _

_ nightwolf: bullshit i was too _

_ nightwolf: ha you see what i did there _

_ nightwolf: BULLshit? _

_ thebull: yes i see _

_ nightwolf: ok fine i may or may not have been looking down at my phone both times _

_ nightwolf: but you have to promise never to tell anyone about this or else im never sleeping with you again _

_ thebull: deal _

_ nightwolf: i guess i really need to look up from my phone when i’m going down stairs _

_ thebull: that might help with avoiding water related incidents _

_ thebull: hey just out of curiosity what were you so distracted by _

_ thebull: arya? _

_ nightwolf: *active 1 min ago* _


End file.
